7/1/08

From 14^th and 6^th to Union Square

- A young lady walking toward me dressed fit to be a socialite and quite attractive from afar, throws off my whole perception of her once we pass each other and our eyes meet. I then realize that her ocean blue, cat eye contact lenses clashed horribly with her spray tan.

- A freakishly tall and frighteningly pale, twenty-something brunette is walking only a few feet to my left in the same direction as me. She is singing out loud and quite dramatically as if she were auditioning for a musical. I’m sure she’s gotten the idea from somewhere that if she “really wants the part” then she must “live and breathe it”, when in reality, all she’s succeeding in doing is scaring small children and making people nervous as they question her sanity.

- I arrive at Commerce Bank on the corner of 14^th and 5^th. It is crowded like I have never seen before in a bank. There are at least fifteen people crammed into the little ATM room before you even get into the bank. Inside the bank:

o I think to myself “Jeez. Why the hell are there so many people here?” as I walk toward the long line I pass a police officer who says to one of the bank’s employees, “Somebody must be givin’ out checks… What the hell are all these people doing here?”

o I notice a tall white guy with his arm around a small and very dark skinned woman sporting a preposterously long weave dyed red and orange toward the ends. I have no issue at all with “the mixing of the races” but I do find that some couples have a way of making their significant other seem like the human equivalent of “The Trucker Hat”.

o As I’m waiting on the long line I look out the window and see a rather hefty young lady of Latin descent wearing a shirt and shorts two to three sizes too small. Seconds later I spot a large Black woman in pretty much the same get up and think to myself “How many times between the two of them does ‘SEXY!’ appear on their clothing and/or bodies?”

o As the teller and I attend to the business at hand, I hear behind me, out of nowhere, “Why don’t you shut up!” Then a barely audible, half hearted attempt at a comeback from a female voice undoubtedly raised in Queens, followed by “Well we don’t all wanna hear you!”, which then lead to the woman complaining about the incident to whomever she was having the conversation with that this bold and courageous fellow did not wish to hear. I’m assuming the cop had either left at this point or was happy to let two New Yorkers be New Yorkers, because I didn’t hear anyone yell “Don’t taze me, bro!”

o On my way out of the bank I see, coming toward the door, a woman whom I am almost certain is the same woman from my neighborhood that I have admired from a distance for some time now. She was wearing big shades so I couldn’t see her eyes or a good portion of her face for that matter, but I was as good as positive that it was her. I hold the door open for her until she gets there; she thanks me and continues inside. When I look back to see if it really was her (among other reasons) she is already looking back at me. Embarrassed (I’m guessing) she says ‘Thank you” again. I smile and say “You’re welcome.” Anyone who knows me well knows exactly what happened next. And for those who don’t – Nothing. My affinity for older women is only rivaled by my fear of speaking to them.

- A nice young man with glasses and a beard who appeared to be collecting signatures, donations or something of the sort (I’ve decided that he couldn’t have been selling anything because he wasn’t at all pushy) succeeded in making eye contact with me, which is something that many others in his same line of work can tell you is a feat damn near impossible. But because I was still busy berating myself for missing an easy opening to finally experience the touch of a Woman, he’d caught me slippin’. What he was not ready for however, was my fool proof safety plan for just such an occasion. I casually began to increase speed and pass by him as I said with an infinitely apologetic expression, “I’m sorry man, I can’t stop. I’m really late.” If you happen to care about what polite strangers think about you; write that down. It can’t be argued with. It’s unfuckwitable.

- I stop at Duane Reade to pick up some toiletries and for an all around good time. While wandering the store aimlessly, picking up items as I spot them, I almost bump into a hopelessly cute little Indian girl about nine years old, wearing black rimmed glasses just the right size for her face. She appeared to be looking for or catching up to her family so neither of us was paying attention to where we were walking, but I’m pretty sure the near accident was mostly my fault. And it was only because she had stopped short that we missed colliding, but still she looked up at me nervously and said “Sorry” before speeding off. As Holden Caulfield might have said, “That killed me.” In fact it made me C[huckle]OL. Then about five minutes later as I was paying for my items, I watched her father snap his fingers and call her name before leaving the store with her mother and two little brothers. When she appeared from one of the aisles a few seconds later, running after them, I suddenly had the feeling that I was standing near the edge of a cliff in a big field of rye and had let one get by me.

- Crossing the street on University Place, another man, this one about forty plus years old and also sporting a beard, managed to grab my attention as I was in somewhat of a daze, still thinking about the little girl from Duane Reade. As a young Black man raised by old school Black women who were raised by old school Black parents from the south, when a Black man old enough to be my father approaches me saying “Excuse me, young brother” it is automatic that I stop, look and listen. He asked me if the phone I had (which I was typing into, the very notes that eventually became this very journal entry) was a camera phone. Always the cynical, weary New Yorker, I lied and told him it was not. He then proceeded to tell me that his was indeed a camera phone and asked me if I could tell him how he might get the pictures off of his phone and printed in some fashion. His daughter had already tried a method involving Bluetooth technology that didn’t work. I gladly told him everything I knew on the subject and we struck up a conversation of small talk as we walked to the Subway entrance at the corner of Broadway. We shook hands and parted ways once inside the station, he headed uptown and I to Brooklyn, which is beyond 14^th street Union Square and will not be mentioned here.